Jules Michelet Quotes

Jules Michelet (French: [ʒyl miʃlɛ]; 21 August 1798 – 9 February 1874) was a French historian and writer. He is best known for his multivolume work Histoire de France (History of France). Michelet was influenced by Giambattista Vico; he admired Vico's emphasis on the role of people and their customs in shaping history, which was a major departure from the then-prominent emphasis on political and military leaders. Michelet also drew inspiration from Vico's concept of the "corsi e ricorsi", the cyclical nature of history, in which societies rise and fall in a recurring pattern.
In Histoire de France, Michelet coined the term Renaissance (meaning "rebirth" in French) as a period in Europe's cultural history that reflected a clear break away from the Middle Ages. This subsequently created a modern understanding of humanity and its place in the newly 'reborn' world. The term "rebirth" and its association with the Renaissance can be traced to a work published in 1550 by the Italian art historian Giorgio Vasari. Vasari used this term to describe the advent of a new manner of painting that began with the work of Giotto, as the "rebirth (rinascita) of the arts". Michelet became the first historian to use and define the French translation of the term, Renaissance, as the label for the post-Medieval era in Europe's cultural history that followed the Middle Ages.
Historian François Furet described Michelet's The History of the French Revolution as "the cornerstone of revolutionary historiography" and "a literary monument."